Esqueletos Travessos

Walt Disney had vision and a grand horizon, but no one ever credited him with genius in the drawing and animation department. His early successes were due to this guy. Ub Iwerks. His 1929 "Skeleton Dance" was probably the first great animated film — clever in so many ways.

Creative differences drove him away from Disney where he had his own shop for a while. But lacking the promotion skills of Disney, he floundered. Eventually he was to come back to Disney, Inc.

But in the last throes of his independence, he remade "Skeleton Dance" in color and with some new effects he had invented. You need to see the two together, especially if you are a student of special effects in films.

This seemed a bit sad: it referenced a work of art so original for its time it seemed pale by comparison and taking into account all the progress made since by others.

Yet, it is nice and clever and important.

Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.

Having just seen Walt Disney's The Skeleton Dance on the Saturday Morning Blog as linked from YouTube, I used those same sources to watch a remake done in Technicolor for the Columbia cartoon unit and animated by the same man-Ub Iwerks. The colors, compared to the earlier black and white, are really used imaginatively here and many of the new gags-like when one of the skeletal band players hits a wrong note constantly or when one loses his head and takes another one's off or when one dances with the other with part of that other gone-are just as funny as the previous short. It does get a little repetitious near the end. Still, Skeleton Frolics is well worth seeing for any animation buff who wants to compare this with the earlier Silly Symphony.

Skeleton Frolics (1937)

*** (out of 4)

Columbia's Technicolor remake of Disney's The Skeleton Dance once against has Iwerks directing. This time out a group of skeletons come back to life just in time to do some dancing and scaring. While this isn't as fun as the original film it's still worth watching for several reasons. The biggest reason is the use of Technicolor, which really makes the skeletons jump off the screen. Iwerks uses the color to his benefit to make for some great visuals including his use of the orange colors. There are some very funny scenes including one, borrowed from the original film, where the skeletons come across a black cat. What happens is slightly different in this version but it still works well.

Interesting cartoon, included on the DVD of "The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra". I especially like the way the color was used in the background art--very artistic for Columbia, whose cartoon department generally had a very low budget (and the results looked like it!)

I do wonder, however, how a certain... um, finger gesture... ever got past the censors. Granted, the gesture in question was seen a lot less frequently in 1937 than it is today. You'd think someone besides the animators would have noticed, though--especially since it's seen three times in the scene in question! And based on the context, I suspect that its inclusion was intentional, something the animators slipped in just to see if the censors WOULD notice!

I would love to own cartoon classics like this one - perfect for Halloween. During All Hallow's Eve is when I enjoy these cartoons the most but I love the for all times of the year.

This one is super cute, for adults as well as the children. It's short and fun. Watching it brings me back to my childhood years... a great feeling.

Sometimes you can find these classic cartoons online for viewing - but I don't know where to buy a collection of these spooky classics but I'd sure love to own them on DVD.

10/10